| 41 |
Spider-Man: Far from Home (2019) #1255
FILM
Main
Directed by Jon Watts. With Tom Holland, Samuel L. Jackson, Jake Gyllenhaal, Marisa Tomei. Following the events of Avengers: Endgame (2019), Spider-Man must step up to take on new threats in a world that has changed forever. |
| 42 |
London Calling: Cold War Letters (2019) #1268
DOCUMENTARY
Main
1 hour. BBC. For over 25 years, the BBC gave voice to the silenced people of East Germany by inviting them to secretly write in to a radio programme called Letters without Signature. Broadcast on the BBC’s German Service, the programme gave voice to ordinary East German citizens who wrote about life under the repressive communist regime. On the 30th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, this documentary explores an unknown story of the Cold War. It looks at the impact of the Letters without Signature series on both the letter writers in East Germany - who faced jail if discovered - and the producers of the show in London, particularly its mysterious presenter, Austin Harrison. Using never-before-seen Stasi files and recordings, London Calling: Cold War Letters documents the tit-for-tat propaganda war between the Stasi and BBC. It reveals a fascinating world of spies, secret state subterfuge and individual acts of bravery. |
| 43 |
The Fall of the Berlin Wall with John Simpson (2019) #1268
DOCUMENTARY
Main
1 hour. BBC. It’s said that journalists write the first draft of history. To mark the 30th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall on 9 November 1989, John Simpson, the BBC’s world affairs editor and longest-serving correspondent, goes back to his reports on what he believes is the most important story he ever covered – the collapse of the Berlin Wall. Back in 1989, John thought this event would change the world for the better, forever. But history has not turned out quite the way he expected. Russia is yet again an enemy of the West, and the Cold War battle that built the Berlin Wall has been replaced with other destabilising global power struggles - even more dangerous and much harder to understand. Three decades on, John wonders if he was wrong to have been so optimistic. Using the anniversary as an opportunity to re-examine how he told the story, John watches the BBC’s extensive archive and talks with historians and other experts to try and understand just how accurate his reporting was. At the heart of the documentary is an intense and personal interview with John. He begins by describing how he grew up in the shadow of the Cold War battle between the capitalist West and the communist East, and how he - like everyone else - believed that this global stand-off would continue for many more decades, ending sooner or later in nuclear war. On 9 November 1989, John, like the rest of the world, in shock at reports that the Berlin Wall’s checkpoints had been opened up, rushed to Berlin to cover the incredible story. With great emotion, John recalls his happiness as he reported from in front of the Wall as Berlin’s people tore it down, until his broadcast was cut off midway by technical failure – giving him by far the most humiliating moment of his long career. After the technical meltdown, John describes how he walked into the crowd feeling utterly depressed. But, surrounded by the thousands of people who had streamed through the checkpoints from East Berlin, untouched by the once trigger-happy border guards and greeted with delight by West Berliners, he could barely believe his own eyes and found himself overwhelmed with joy. So, why has the legacy of the Wall not turned out the way John hoped and expected? He examines why he did not predict that the pace of change across Europe would lead to the terrible war in Yugoslavia, nor that Russia, with Vladimir Putin – a former KGB agent – as its president, would find a new guise in which to become a bitter enemy of the West. John also reflects on the terrifying uncertainty of global politics today, which has left him with a certain nostalgia for the decades of the Cold War – a period that was certainly frightening, but arguably less so than the uncertainty and complexity of global politics that we live with today. |
| 44 |
This Week (18/7/2019) (2019) #1295
DOCUMENTARY
Main
65mins. BBC. The final episode. In February 2019, following Neil's decision to step down as host, the BBC announced that This Week would end in July 2019. The final episode aired on 18 July 2019, a live broadcast from Westminster Central Hall with an invited audience of political dignitaries and celebrities. For the final time after 16 years, Andrew Neil reviews the political week with Michael Portillo, Alan Johnson, Miranda Green and Piers Morgan. Some of the team will also appear in a series of Grease-inspired films, alongside Liam Halligan, Liz Kendall and Kevin Maguire. There will be guest appearances from Jan Ravens and Diane Abbott in the extended programme. |
| 45 |
Joker (2019) #1307
FILM
Main
Directed by Todd Phillips. With Joaquin Phoenix, Robert De Niro, Zazie Beetz, Frances Conroy. In Gotham City, mentally troubled comedian Arthur Fleck is disregarded and mistreated by society. He then embarks on a downward spiral of revolution and bloody crime. This path brings him face-to-face with his alter-ego: the Joker. |
| 46 |
Einstein's Quantum Riddle (2019) #1321
DOCUMENTARY
Special
1 hour. BBC. Einstein’s Quantum Riddle tells the remarkable story of perhaps the strangest phenomenon in science – quantum entanglement. It’s a story of mind-bending concepts and brilliant experiments, which lead us to a profound new understanding of reality. At the start of the 20th century Albert Einstein helped usher in quantum mechanics - a revolutionary description of the behaviour of tiny particles. But he soon became uncomfortable with the counterintuitive ideas at the heart of the theory. He hunted for flaws in the equations and eventually discovered that they predicted a seemingly impossible situation. Quantum theory suggested you could have two particles, which had interacted in the past, and even if you separated them by millions of miles they would somehow act in unison. If you measured one, forcing it to take on one of many properties, the other would instantly take on a corresponding property. Like rolling two dice, millions of miles apart, and as you look at one to see what number it landed on, the other instantly shows the same number. This bizarre prediction of magically connected particles became known as quantum entanglement. Einstein felt it couldn’t possibly be real – it seemed to break the rules of space and time. In 1935, with two of his colleagues, he published a paper that argued that this bizarre phenomenon implied the equations of quantum theory must be incomplete. No-one could think of a way to test whether Einstein was right, until in 1964, John Bell, a physicist form Northern Ireland, published an astonishing paper. He’d found a key difference between Einstein’s ideas and those of quantum theory. It all boiled down to entanglement. As Professor David Kaiser puts it: ‘We now know this was one of the most significant articles in the history of physics. Not just the history of 20th-century physics; in the history of the field as a whole.’ In 1972 John Clauser and Stuart Freedman built an experiment based on John Bell’s work and found the first experimental evidence to suggest that quantum entanglement really is a part of the natural world. Today, a technological revolution is under way, with labs around the world harnessing entanglement to create powerful new technologies such as quantum computers. At Google’s quantum computing lab in Santa Barbara, researcher Marissa Giustina describes their latest quantum-processing chip. And in Shanghai, at the University of Science and Technology, Professor Jian-Wei Pan explains that his team is working to send entangled particles from a satellite to a ground station to create totally secure communication links – a major step towards the creation of an unhackable ‘quantum internet’ of the future based on quantum entanglement. Yet despite this progress, questions still remain about our experimental proof of entanglement. There are possible loopholes that could mean that entanglement may be an illusion and that Einstein was right all along. At the Roque de los Muchachos Observatory in the Canary Islands, Professor Anton Zeilinger’s team is attempting a remarkable experiment to rule out the most challenging loophole. Their experiment uses two of Europe’s largest telescopes to collect light from two quasars, billions of light years away, to control intricate measurements of tiny quantum particles and put quantum entanglement to the ultimate test. |
| 47 |
Lucy Worsley's Christmas Carol Odyssey (2019) #1340
DOCUMENTARY-MUSIC
Main
1 hour. BBC. In this festive treat featuring the Kingdom Choir and Hampton Court Choir, Lucy Worsley reveals that there’s much more to our best-loved carols than meets the eye. She reveals how their stories add up to a special kind of history of Christmas itself. In the ancient past, the wassail, a pagan fertility ritual, gave us door-to-door carol singing. Wassailing was also an integral part of an older midwinter festival that was adopted by Christianity when it came to Britain, and was rebranded as ‘Christmas’. Religion, however, soon turned its back on carols. They were far too frivolous for the Puritans, who wanted to ban Christmas altogether. French Catholics on the other hand didn’t mind fun and frolics, and Lucy crosses the channel to learn a French renaissance jig, written by a dancing priest in the 16th century. The tune she dances to went on to become the carol Ding Dong Merrily on High in the 19th century. In strict Protestant Britain, the carol survived outside the Church and new ones turned up in some surprising places. Lucy visits the British Library, where she discovers an 18th-century children’s book that contains a little memory game called The Twelve Days of Christmas. Christmas carols could also be politically dangerous and subversive. British Catholics were oppressed for generations after the Reformation, but one Catholic scribe, John Francis Wade, hid a coded message of support for a Jacobite rebellion in the carol O Come All Ye Faithful. Eventually, the Church of England couldn’t resist the power of the carol, and finally opened its doors to all of them, thanks to a chance pairing of words and music in Hark the Herald Angels Sing, performed in the programme by the renowned gospel ensemble, The Kingdom Choir. In the 20th century, Ralph Vaughan Williams’s passion for English folk music took him to the villages of Surrey. Here, Lucy meets a folk singer who tells the tale of an elderly farm labourer, Henry Garman, who sang a tune for Vaughan Williams, which became O Little Town of Bethlehem. Finally, in the snowy Austrian Alps, Lucy discovers the simple story of a young parish priest with a poem in search of a tune. When he found one, the result was Silent Night. During the First World War, this simple carol would become a hymn for peace during the famous Christmas truce of 1914. Silent Night also reminds us that carols are, and have always been, ‘popular music’, music for the people, fulfilling an enduring need to celebrate and sing together at Christmas. |
| 48 |
Alita: Battle Angel (2019) #1342
FILM
Main
Directed by Robert Rodriguez. With Rosa Salazar, Christoph Waltz, Jennifer Connelly, Mahershala Ali. A deactivated cyborg's revived, but can't remember anything of her past and goes on a quest to find out who she is. |
| 49 |
The Jeremy Thorpe Scandal (2018) #1108
DOCUMENTARY
Special
1 hour. BBC. In 1979, Panorama reporter Tom Mangold led an investigation into the trial of Jeremy Thorpe and others for the alleged conspiracy to kill Thorpe's former lover, Norman Scott. Convinced that the former Liberal Party leader would be found guilty, a special post-trial programme was prepared. This was scrapped, however, when the jury returned its verdicts of not guilty for all defendants, and the programme has remained unseen for almost 40 years. Edited and updated with new information about a fresh 2017 police inquiry into the case, Tom Mangold finally presents his story about how powerful political forces tried to protect Thorpe. The programme features revealing interviews from 1979 with Norman Scott, chief prosecution witness Peter Bessell and the alleged hitman Andrew 'Gino' Newton. |
| 50 |
Suffragettes with Lucy Worsley (2018) #1110
DOCUMENTARY
Main
90mins. BBC. 2018 marks 100 years since the first women over the age of 30, who owned property, were allowed to vote in the UK. The fight for the vote was about much more than just the Pankhurst family or Emily Davidson's fateful collision with the king's horse. In this film, Lucy is at the heart of the drama, alongside a group of less well known, but equally astonishing, young working-class suffragettes who decided to go against every rule and expectation that Edwardian society had about them. Lucy explores the actions of these women as their campaign becomes more and more dangerous, while their own words are delivered in simple but strikingly emotive pieces of dramatised testimony. Lucy also tells this story from a range of iconic original locations, from the Houses of Parliament and 10 Downing Street to the Savoy Hotel, and has access to an amazing range of artefacts, from hunger-striking medals to defused bombs and private letters between the government and the press. In this Edwardian history drama, Lucy and her group of suffragettes from the Women's Social Political Union reveal what life was like for these young women, as she follows the trail of increasingly illegal and dangerous acts they would end up committing. For while they would start with peaceful protests, but they would go from to obstruction to vandalism and finally to arson and bomb making. Lucy investigates what drove them to break the law, to the prison conditions they experienced, including violent force feedings and the subsequent radicalisation of these women that occurred, driving them to more and more extreme actions. Lucy looks at the ways in which the press responded to the suffragettes and their own use of PR and branding to counteract the negative portrayals - from WSPU postcards to pennants and exhibitions. The decisive and largely negative role that members of Parliament played is unpacked, as they would throw out numerous attempts to give women the vote. The role of the police is explored, both in the ways in which the suffragettes' demonstrations were handled and the covert and sometimes violent tactics that were used against them. As the actions of the suffragettes became increasingly extreme, it would take a world-changing event to stop their campaign in its tracks and allow some form of equality at the ballot box. |
| 51 |
Mark Kermode's Secrets of Cinema (2018) #1129
DOCUMENTARY
Special
5x1 hour episodes. BBC Mark Kermode reveals the film-making tricks and techniques behind classic movie genres, from romcoms to horrors. Series 1 1/5 The Romcom. Mark Kermode examines the cinematic tricks involved in creating a classic romantic comedy. 2/5 The Heist. Mark reveals the cinematic tricks and techniques behind classic heist movies. 3/5 Coming of Age. Mark reveals the cinematic tricks and techniques behind coming-of-age films. 4/5 Science Fiction. Mark Kermode reveals the cinematic tricks and techniques behind science fiction films. 5/5 Horror. Mark Kermode reveals the cinematic tricks and techniques behind horror films. |
| 52 |
Black Earth Rising (2018) #1144
TV DRAMA
Special
With Michaela Coel, John Goodman, Noma Dumezweni, Lucian Msamati. Kate Ashby was rescued as a child from the Rwandan genocide by her renowned international lawyer adopted mother Eve. Living in London and working for barrister Michael Ennis, Kate's mother takes on a case involving an African militia leader which will upend both their lives forever. 8x1 hour episodes. BBC. 1/8 In Other News: British citizen Kate Ashby finds the shadow of her Rwandan past impossible to escape. 2/8 Looking at the Past: A shocking incident in the Hague throws Kate into a new investigation. 3/8 A Ghost in Name: Facing down personal threats, Kate works with Michael to defend Alice Munezero. 4/8 A Bowl of Cornflakes: A notorious war criminal appears in the UK, creating tensions between Kate and Michael. 5/8 The Eyes of the Devil: Alienated from Michael, Kate considers helping the Rwandans bring Ganimana to justice. 6/8 The Game's True Nature: Kate risks her life to find a key file prepared by her mother years earlier. 7/8 Double Bogey on the Ninth: As Michael works to expose a crime, Kate learns the truth about her own history. 8/8 The Forgiving Earth: Kate travels alone to Africa seeking the final truths about her personal history. |
| 53 |
Dazzling Duets at the BBC (2018) #1145
MUSIC
Main
1 hour. BBC. Dazzling duets from four decades of BBC entertainment, from Parkinson to the Proms. Whether it's pianos or banjos, violins or voices, kora, erhu or harmonica, this is a journey full of striking partnerships and extraordinary combinations. Oscar Peterson, Larry Adler, Ballake Sissoko, Kiri Te Kanawa, Nigel Kennedy and Bela Fleck are just some of the featured artists bringing us a musical feast, full of fun and surprises. George Gershwin I Got Rhythm Performer: Stéphane Grappelli. Performer: Yehudi Menuhin. Oscar Peterson & André Previn Improvisation Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart La ci darem la mano Performer: Plácido Domingo. Performer: Susan Graham. John Dowland My Lord Willoughby's Welcome Home Performer: Julian Bream. Nigel Kennedy & Doug Boyle The Wind Cries Mary Lyricist: Jimi Hendrix. Johann Sebastian Bach Concerto in C minor Performer: Güher Pekinel. Performer: Süher Pekinel. Béla Fleck & Abigail Washburn Banjo Banjo Robert Schumann Ich bin dein Baum Performer: Janet Baker. Performer: Peter Savage. Ballaké Sissoko & Vincent Ségal Musique de Nuit Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart Concerto for Flute and Harp Performer: James Galway. Performer: Marisa Robles. Rodrigo Sánchez & Gabriela Quintero Tamacun Franz Liszt Hungarian Rhapsody No. 2 Performer: Victor Borge. Performer: Sahan Arzruni. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart Bei Mannern welche Liebe Fyhlen Performer: Kiri Te Kanawa. Performer: Thomas Allen. Johann Sebastian Bach Duet No. 3 in E Flat major Performer: Heinz Holliger. Performer: Maurice Bourgue. Léo Delibes Flower Duet Performer: Diana Damrau. Performer: Nadia Krasteva. Scott Joplin Maple Leaf Rag Performer: Katia Labèque. Performer: Marielle Labèque. Béla Bartók Pizzicato and Dance from Maramaros George Gershwin Summertime - A woman is a sometime thing (Porgy and Bess - suite) Performer: Larry Adler. Performer: Itzhak Perlman. |
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They Shall Not Grow Old (2018) #1149
FILM
Main
Directed by Peter Jackson. A documentary about World War I with never-before-seen footage to commemorate the centennial of the end of the war. Employing state-of-the-art technology to transform audio and moving image archive footage more than a century old, Peter Jackson brings to life the people who can best tell the story of World War I: the men who were there. Driven by a personal interest in the conflict, Jackson sets out to explore the day-to-day experience of its combatants. Immersed for months in the BBC and Imperial War Museum archives, Jackson created narratives and strategies regarding how this story should be told. Using only the voices of those involved, the film explores the reality of war on the front line: their attitudes to the conflict, how they ate, rested and formed friendships in those moments between battles, as well as their hopes and dreams for the future. Each frame of the film has been hand-colourised by Jackson's team, the footage 3D-digitised, transformed with modern post-production techniques, enabling these soldiers to walk and talk among us. Reaching into the mists of time, Jackson aims to give these men voices, investigate the hopes and fears of these veterans that survived and were able to tell their stories, and detail the humility and humanity of those who represented a generation forever changed by the destruction of a global war. |
| 55 |
Wonders of the Moon (2018) #1160
DOCUMENTARY
Main
1 hour. BBC. Documentary which uses the latest, most detailed imagery to reveal the monthly life cycle of the moon. From Wales to Wyoming, Hong Kong to Croydon, the programme finds out how the moon shapes life on Earth, as well as exploring its mysterious dark side and discovering how the moon's journey around Earth delivers one of nature's most awe-inspiring events - a total solar eclipse. And at the end of a remarkable year of lunar activity, we find out why so many supermoons have been lighting up the night sky. |
| 56 |
The Joy of Winning (2018) #1161
DOCUMENTARY
Main
1 hour. BBC. How to have a happier life and a better world all thanks to maths, in this witty, mind-expanding guide to the science of success with Hannah Fry. Following in the footsteps of BBC Four's award-winning maths films The Joy of Stats and The Joy of Data, this latest gleefully nerdy adventure sees mathematician Dr Hannah Fry unlock the essential strategies you'll need to get what you want - to win - more of the time. From how to bag a bargain dinner to how best to stop the kids arguing on a long car journey, maths can give you a winning strategy. And the same rules apply to the world's biggest problems - whether it's avoiding nuclear annihilation or tackling climate change. Deploying 'The Joys Of...' films' trademark mix of playful animation alongside both oddball demos and contributions from the world's biggest brains, Fry shows how this field of maths - known as game theory - is the essential key to help you get your way. She reveals ways to analyse any situation, and methods of calculating the consequences of getting what you want. Expect tips on taking advantage of what your opponents do, but also pleasing proof that cooperation might get you further than conflict. Fry also hails the 20th-century scientists like John von Neumann and John Nash who worked out the science of success. They may not be household names, but they transformed economics, politics, psychology and evolutionary biology in the process - and their work, Hannah demonstrates, could even be shown to prove the existence and advantage of goodness. Along the way the film reveals, amongst other things, what links the rapper Ludacris, a Kentucky sheriff, a Nobel Prize winner and doping in professional cycling. And there's an irresistible chance to revisit the most excruciatingly painful and the most genius scenes ever seen on a TV game show, as Hannah unpacks the maths behind the legendary show Golden Balls and hails Nick Corrigan, the contestant whose cunning gameplay managed to break the supposedly intractable 'Prisoner's Dilemma'. Other contributors to The Joy of Winning include European number one professional female poker player Liv Boeree, Scottish ex-pro cyclist and anti-doping campaigner (banned for 2 years in 2004 for doping) David Millar, Israeli game theory expert Dr Haim Shapira - who shows why it is sometimes rational to be irrational - and top evolutionary game theorist Professor Karl Sigmund from the University of Vienna. |
| 57 |
Leave No Trace (2018) #1175
FILM
Main
Directed by Debra Granik. With Thomasin McKenzie, Ben Foster, Jeffery Rifflard, Derek John Drescher. A father and his thirteen year-old daughter are living an ideal existence in a vast urban park in Portland, Oregon, when a small mistake derails their lives forever. |
| 58 |
Red Joan (2018) #1359
FILM
Main
Directed by Trevor Nunn. With Judi Dench, Sophie Cookson, Stephen Campbell Moore, Tom Hughes. The story of Joan Stanley, who was exposed as the K.G.B.'s longest-serving British spy. |
| 59 |
Art of France (2017) #976
DOCUMENTARY
Main
3x1 hour. BBC. Andrew Graham Dixon takes viewers on a stunning visual journey through French art history. 1/3 Plus Ca Change. French art's development up to the arrival of Classicism and the Age of Enlightenment. 2/3 There Will Be Blood. Andrew Graham-Dixon explores how art took a dramatic turn following the French Revolution. 3/3 This Is the Modern World. France's angry young artists re-invent how to paint. |
| 60 |
British History's Biggest Fibs with Lucy Worsley (2017) #977
DOCUMENTARY
Main
3x1 hour. BBC. Lucy Worsley explores how British history is a concoction of fibs and stories manipulated by whoever was in power at the time. 1/3 The Wars of the Roses. Lucy debunks the foundation myth of one of our favourite royal dynasties, the Tudors. 2/3 The Glorious Revolution. Debunking the Glorious Revolution, when William of Orange stole the throne from James II. 3/3 The Jewel in the Crown. Lucy debunks the fibs that surround India, the 'jewel in the crown' of the British Empire. |
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